a couple of interesting asides regarding gold and how...

a couple of interesting asides regarding gold and how politicians keep getting it wrong -

between 1999 and 2002 Gordon Brown who was then the British Chancellor of the Exchequer (the equivalent of our Australian Treasurer) sold 395t of Britain's gold reserves for a price of $US256-296/oz. this was done rather surreptitiously, there was certainly no accompanying fanfare.
for his sins he was later handed the Prime Ministership.

in 1997 Peter Costello (who is generally regarded as having been a very good fiscal regulator) sold off 167t of Australia's gold reserves when he was Treasurer. this represented 2/3rds of our gold and brought our remaining reserves down to around 80t. sold at ~$US306/oz it netted a total of ~$US2.0bn. he could have made amends two years later buying back that same gold in 1999 when the gold price fell to $US250. but good old Pete had declared that "gold no longer played a significant role in the international financial system" at the time of the sale so i guess he was never going to go back on his original stance.
he was never gifted the Prime Ministership.